＜prologue＞
I started a blog called “The Baby Boomer Generation’s Miscellaneous Blog”（Dankai-sedai no garakutatyou:団塊世代の我楽多（がらくた）帳） in July 2018, about a year before I fully retired. More than six years have passed since then, and the number of articles has increased considerably.
So, in order to make them accessible to people who don’t understand Japanese, I decided to translate my past articles into English and publish them.
It may sound a bit exaggerated, but I would like to make this my life’s work.
It should be noted that haiku and waka （Japanese short fixed form poems） are quite difficult to translate into English, so some parts are written in Japanese.
If you are interested in haiku or waka and would like to know more, please read introductory or specialized books on haiku or waka written in English.
I also write many articles about the Japanese language. I would be happy if these inspire more people to want to learn Japanese.
my blog’s URL:団塊世代の我楽多（がらくた）帳 | 団塊世代が雑学や面白い話を発信しています
my X’s URL:団塊世代の我楽多帳（@historia49）さん / X
<Added on September 1, 2020> Reports of trouble occurring at “trail running” events
The 2019 “Mount Nose Myoken Power Trail Run” (*) event, which runs up Mount Nose Myoken in Osaka Prefecture, was held without the prior consent or permission of Yoshikawa Hachiman Shrine, with the trail run course set up and passing through the shrine’s grounds.
The shrine reportedly suffered some damage, including a lantern being knocked down by a runner, but the organizers did not offer an apology, merely saying that they would cover the damage with insurance, and the organizers expressed outrage at this dishonest attitude.
(*) The “Mount Nose Myoken Power Trail Run” is a competition that began in 2017. It is a trail run that loops around the satoyama area, visiting power spots such as Mount Nose Myoken, the Kansai region’s foremost Nichiren Buddhist sacred site, as well as Kodai-ji Temple, Yoshikawa Hachiman Shrine, and Hontaki-ji Temple. The 2020 event is scheduled to take place on Saturday, December 5th.
The 2020 NHK Taiga drama “Kirin ga Kuru” centers on the loser Akechi Mitsuhide (?-1582). The 2018 NHK Taiga drama “Sego Don” centers on Saigo Takamori (1828-1877), one of the “Ten Great Men of the Meiji Restoration” who played a major role in the bloodless surrender of Edo Castle from the end of the Edo period to the Meiji era, but was defeated in the Satsuma Rebellion (1877) and ultimately became a loser.
Recently, “imaginary runs” have been gaining attention, in which participants run along the “paths of defeat”—the animal-like paths that defeated soldiers took in their final days—while thinking about historical losers.
1. Saigo Takamori’s Path of Defeat
Nikkei MJ (November 30, 2019) introduced the “Path of Defeat Run” as follows:
Pursuers creeping up. His subordinates are dwindling, and his supplies are about to run out. I wonder what the defeated general must have felt as he fled. Just imagining it makes my heart ache and makes me feel sentimental. Perhaps it’s this emotional appeal that has drawn attention to the paths of military commanders’ defeat. Tracing the routes of those defeated warriors, I can imagine the scenery they saw and the emotions they felt. “Ah, that person must have passed through here, too.”
A crowdfunding campaign aimed at reviving the ancient road associated with Saigo Takamori, known as the “Saigō Trail 1877,” through the trail running event “SAIGŌ Trail 1877” has reportedly exceeded its target of 700,000 yen in just 20 days since its launch on October 2, 2019.
The “SAIGŌ Trail 1877 Executive Committee” (Secretariat: Miyazaki City/Executive Chairman: Takuya Koike) plans to use the event to maintain and promote the ancient road, with the aim of turning it into a long trail that anyone can enjoy, including hiking.
On August 17, 1877, following their defeat in the Seinan War, approximately 500 Satsuma troops led by Saigo Takamori broke through a government army encirclement in the small village of Tabaruno (now Nobeoka City) in northern Miyazaki Prefecture, and began a 400-km escape toward their hometown of Kagoshima. Saigo and his men traveled for 16 days to reach Shiroyama in Kagoshima, where they met their end. A portion of the ancient road marking Saigo’s final footsteps remains to this day, mainly in northern Miyazaki Prefecture, known as the “Route of Saigo Takamori’s Return.”
2. Other Routes of Retreat
(1) Akechi Mitsuhide
After defeating Oda Nobunaga in the Honnoji Incident (1582), Akechi Mitsuhide attempted to rally his allies, but things did not go as planned. Instead, he was pursued by Hashiba Hideyoshi’s “Great Return from the Chugoku Region.” After his defeat in the Battle of Yamazaki (1582), he fled to Sakamoto Castle, where he was caught in a hunt for defeated samurai and seriously injured, leading to his suicide.
(2) Prince Otomo
Prince Otomo (648-672) was the eldest son of Emperor Tenji. He was defeated by his younger brother, Prince Oama (later Emperor Tenmu), during the Jinshin War (672), a succession dispute between the two. He fled the battlefield and committed suicide.
(3) Shimazu Toyohisa
Shimazu Toyohisa (1570-1600) was a military commander during the Azuchi-Momoyama period. He fought on the Western side of the Battle of Sekigahara (1600) alongside his uncle, Shimazu Yoshihiro (1535-1619). However, during the melee, the Eastern Army gained the upper hand, and he and his uncle were pursued by the Eastern Army, cutting off their retreat. Determined to ensure his uncle’s return to Satsuma alive, he served as the rear guard and was killed in battle.
Thanks to his courageous fighting, his uncle, Shimazu Yoshihiro, was able to safely retreat toward the Ise Kaido, narrowly missing Ieyasu’s main camp (the Shimazu retreat).
The Shimazu army’s strategy to break through the Tokugawa army’s center employed the “sutekamari” (a lizard’s tail-cutting) tactic, in which the entire army sacrificed their lives to allow their lord, Shimazu Yoshihiro, to escape. It’s said that this strategy reduced the number of troops from 1,000 to 60. However, the success of this breakthrough was due not only to the mental strength of the Satsuma samurai, but also to the power of the “waist-mounted guns” carried by foot soldiers and even high-ranking samurai.
While samurai at the time considered guns to be cowardly projectiles and only assigned them to foot soldiers, this view was unheard of in Satsuma, and even high-ranking samurai had a rational reason for using firearms. From this time on, the Satsuma domain was imbued with a rational spirit known as “hentsu” (the ability to freely change and adapt to the situation, and to change oneself without being bound by the past).
Shimazu Yoshihiro initially responded to a request for reinforcements from Tokugawa Ieyasu by rushing to Fushimi Castle, where Torii Mototada was holed up, as “Tokugawa reinforcements.” However, Torii Mototada refused to enter the castle, claiming that he had “never heard of a request for reinforcements from the Shimazu clan,” leaving him isolated among the large Western Army led by Ishida Mitsunari that had descended on Fushimi Castle. It is said that this led him to decide to side with the “Western Army.”
As an aside, after the Battle of Sekigahara, the Chosokabe clan of Tosa was defeated, but the Shimazu clan of Satsuma was not. This was because Toyotomi Hideyori was still in Osaka Castle at the time, and the western provinces were filled with Toyotomi-affiliated daimyo, so Tokugawa Ieyasu apparently judged it dangerous to use long supply lines from Kanto to attack Satsuma.
Ironically, however, more than 360 years later, the Tokugawa shogunate would be destroyed by anti-shogunate forces centered around the Satsuma domain.